What Does Bid For Dow Jones Mean To GE's CNBC?

from the domino-effect dept

As people continue to chew over News Corp.'s bid for Dow Jones, some are wondering what the potential implications are for financial news network CNBC, which is a joint venture between Dow Jones and GE's NBC unit. Because News Corp. is going to launch its own Fox business channel at some point, it seems inevitable that the company would extricate Dow Jones from CNBC (as soon as legally possible), if its bid were to be successful. As it is, a Fox business channel would likely prove to be a formidable competitor to CNBC (just look what Fox News did to CNN's ratings), and the addition of Dow Jones' assets would make it even more so. All of this comes at a time when some are encouraging GE to divest itself of non-core assets, like NBC. Obviously, CNBC isn't a big part of GE's total operations, but it is significant to the NBC business. If Dow Jones appears ready to accept an offer from News Corp. (which remains in doubt at the moment), GE might have to look seriously at the future of CNBC, and by extension NBC. Some are speculating that GE might make a rival bid for Dow Jones; the company could probably afford it, but it would be extremely costly, considering how rich the offer from News Corp. is. If GE were to do something else with NBC, such as spin it off or sell it to private equity (all of which is entirely speculative right now), then News Corp.'s offer for Dow Jones could represent the beginning of some major changes across the big media landscape.

(Three Years later)
Fox launched its business channel today, CNBC lost half of it viewers, bringing its total number of viewers to 3. Fox Business has also brought in 2 new viwers into the cable business channels. Reportedly these two new viewers are former President George W. Bush and Former Vice President Dick Cheney, who are tired of hearing the liberal slant of CNBC are now delighted to know that the new Fox News / Dow Jones Industrial Average went down for the entirety of the Clinton Administartion, and up for the entire Bush administration.

In other news, the Fox News / Wall Street is reporting President Barack Obama is responisible for the Great Depression.

It's the content that matters

Indoctrination ala 1984

This Orwellian homogenization of the newsertainment industrial complex serves to effectively abrogate the right of freedom of the press for anyone who gets their newsertainment primarily or exclusively from TV. We are disabused of nothing. Lindsay Lohan and The Sopranos serve as the top stories on newscasts (Well, The Sopranos I understand). What? Fire Brian Williams. Let Mary Hart read the news. It's all the same thing anyway. God forbid the Internet is ever reduced to the same monological drivel. There I can at least choose my content instead of being proselytized by the man. Let the odious, onanastic Big Brother try to get in Paris Hilton's pants on his own time. But I may be overreacting.